November 27, 2004
A RIVAL SUPERPOWER?:
A Parent's Worst Nightmare in China: Wave of knife assaults on children can be seen as cries for help in a society where economic growth has created rising social tensions, analysts say. (Ching-Ching Ni, November 27, 2004, LA Times)
Analysts say the attacks demonstrate how crime has escalated in a country once viewed as virtually crime-free. More than two decades of economic growth have created rising social tensions but few institutions to address them.The attacks on children, analysts say, can also be seen as cries for help.
"It's no longer just about personal revenge," said Zhao Xiao, a Beijing-based scholar who studies transitional economies. "They also want … impact. That's why they are seeking out little children to make their point by attacking someone even weaker. This is potentially a very scary development."
In September, farmer Yang Guozhu woke up, shaved his head, bought some sunglasses and marched into a day-care center in the eastern Chinese city of Suzhou. He used a fruit knife to attack children. Twenty-eight were wounded; the oldest was 6 and the youngest 2.
According to Yang's account in Chinese media reports, he was forced to take drastic action because no one would pay attention to his family tragedy. Back in his village, Yang's younger brother and the brother's girlfriend had been charged with living together illegally. The village's family planning committee levied a fine on Yang's parents and confiscated their meager possessions: 17 sacks of grain and three bags of fertilizer.
A year later, the committee imposed a new fine, this time $1,200, an unobtainable sum for the peasants. Feeling helpless and humiliated, his parents committed suicide by drinking pesticide.
Yang and his siblings preserved their parents' bodies so they could seek justice. But local officials forcefully removed the corpses for cremation and beat relatives who tried to stop them.
After failed attempts to seek redress, Yang told a friend he would do something that everyone would hear about. For maximum impact, he picked Sept. 11, the three-year anniversary of the terrorist attacks in the United States. A week earlier, Yang watched militants shock the world by killing more than 300 people — mostly young children — at a school in Beslan, Russia.
Yang's target was a local elementary school. He apparently went prepared with gasoline and homemade explosives. But this year, Sept. 11 fell on a Saturday and the campus was empty. So he made his target the day-care center.
A culture where Columbine is a rational form of protest.... Posted by Orrin Judd at November 27, 2004 3:57 PM
Most inscrutable. Why attack totally innocent children? Why not take out somebody directly responsible for the earlier tragedies, such as some commie judge or donut-eater?+
Posted by: Lou Gots at November 27, 2004 4:16 PMThis is a society that has gone from feudalism to being carved up by colonial overlords from Britain and Japan to the crushing tyranny of the Cultural Revolution to a market based economy in the span of 120 years. I'd say they are holding up pretty good under the circumstances.
Don't think that they will not be a power to reckon with OJ. Rapid development brings with it rapid dislocation. Societies are only calm and peaceful at the bottom and at the top, the way up and the way down can be hell.
Posted by: Robert Duquette at November 27, 2004 4:43 PMRobert,
The problem is that China has always had centrifugal forces. A unified China is far more the exception than the rule, even though the population is over 94% Han. The development has been extremely regionalised, with areas like Canton and Szechuan booming while other regions languish unchanged from the Manchus. China consists of 22 provinces, including Taiwan, and it is far from inconceivable that it could devolve into 22 Chinas.
I wouldn't place to much political relevance on the foul behavior of a psychopath.
Posted by: Bart at November 27, 2004 4:56 PMThe Chinese do have a real problem with social morality. They do not cooperate easily, so conflicts often arise. They rarely forgive offenses. And there's no one more inclined to vicious retaliation than a Chinese nursing a grudge (except, of course, a Korean nursing a grudge). It's best to avoid getting into fights with east Asians.
Posted by: pj at November 27, 2004 5:50 PMI just finished Chihua Wen's 'The Red Mirror,' which is a series of brief memoirs of children of intellectuals who were purged in the Cultural Revolution.
Nothing that has happened in China has done anything to really address the gap between peasants and privileged. Someday they'll burn down the manor houses or, their present-day equivalent, factories and offices.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at November 28, 2004 7:52 PMThe probability that China will experience further significant social upheaval doesn't also mean that China, or some part thereof, will not enhance their position as a global military and economic player.
Posted by: Michael Herdegen at November 29, 2004 9:30 AMYes, a state that's not China will have a future.
Posted by: oj at November 29, 2004 10:54 AMHarry:
In fact, the gap between the ins and the outs in China has gotten even worse. Besides monopolizing political power, the ins can now also get green cards in the US and cushy jobs with multinationals in Hong Kong and the West. Only those who believe blindly in the primacy of economics will excuse the unforgiveable political sins of the Communist regime.
Posted by: X at November 29, 2004 12:48 PM